OneTab: For When You Have Too Many Browser Tabs
Here’s a Tech Trick for you folks who always have too many browser tabs open. Which is all of us, right?
OneTab is a browser add-on for those of us who have open too many rabbit holes…which is to say, you have a lot of tabs and (1) you can’t close them because you need to and (2) there’s no organization to any of it.
Skill Level & Requirements
You need one of the following browsers (though I’ve only used it in Chrome):
- Chrome
- Firefox
- Edge
- Safari
This one is pretty simple to set up if you’re familiar with browser add-ons.
Uses
I use OneTab for two things: collections and bookmarks.
Sometimes I find myself with a lot of useful sites open. For example, I’ll be researching how to integrate an API into a particular application (yeah, I do that) or maybe I can’t find the *perfect* Nike shoe to buy (or both at the same time). I use OneTab to collect those sites into one (topical) location.
The same applies to bookmarks – only they’re contained in different categories (of my choosing) and are locked down so I don’t lose them.
Now that I write it down, those two uses sound about the same. But wait, I’ll show you why it’s not.
Tech Trick Explained
Let’s say that I’m headed to New Jersey, and I’ve been researching the best seafood places on LBI. Only it’s 11 p.m. at night and I’m ready to go to bed, but I haven’t had a chance to go through all the tabs I have open.
First, make sure that all the tabs you want to combine into one category are in the same browser window.
Click on the cute little hot-air balloon:
Instantly, your tabs will collapse into a new tab.
Here’s where the difference in collections comes in.
Let’s say these tabs are just research tabs that I don’t need to save. If that’s the case, then I don’t need to worry about doing anything else.
The next day, I’ll open my browser, right click on the OneTab icon and select “OneTab” to open up the tab.
Once I go back in to click on the link, the link DISAPPEARS.
This is handy when you’re just going through tabs to weed them out.
Now let’s say you want to save tabs to OneTab. Click on “More” when you’re in the OneTab application and click “Lock this tab group.” That will keep all of the links regardless of whether the links have been clicked on. You can also rename the group to help you keep them straight.
